The Mind of a Bee

by Lars Chittka

A rich and surprising exploration of the intelligence of bees

Most of us are aware of the hive mind—the power of bees as an amazing collective. But do we know how uniquely intelligent bees are as individuals? In The Mind of a Bee, Lars Chittka draws from decades of research, including his own pioneering work, to argue that bees have remarkable cognitive abilities. He shows that they are profoundly smart, have distinct personalities, can recognize flowers and human faces, exhibit basic emotions, count, use simple tools, solve problems, and learn by observing others. They may even possess consciousness.

Taking readers deep into the sensory world of bees, Chittka illustrates how bee brains are unparalleled in the animal kingdom in terms of how much sophisticated material is packed into their tiny nervous systems. He looks at their innate behaviors and the ways their evolution as foragers may have contributed to their keen spatial memory. Chittka also examines the psychological differences between bees and the ethical dilemmas that arise in conservation and laboratory settings because bees feel and think. Throughout, he touches on the fascinating history behind the study of bee behavior.

Exploring an insect whose sensory experiences rival those of humans, The Mind of a Bee reveals the singular abilities of some of the world’s most incredible creatures.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Nature, Biology, Audiobook, Animals, Psychology

397 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 26, 2022

Reviews

[Irene · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having already read Honeybee Democracy, which is referenced quite often in this book, and The Lives of Bees: The Untold Story of the Honey Bee in the Wild, I had a solid base before starting this one, but I think reading this book first would have been better. It's broader in its scope, so if you haven't read Seeley's yet, you may want to start here instead. Definitely read Honeybee Democracy afterwards, though, since it details the waggle dance and the social structure of bees, and it's fascinating. Also referenced assiduously is Karl von Frisch, who was a giant in this field of study. I have yet to read any of his books because I think they're even more technical than Seeley's, but Animal Architecture is calling my name.

Chittka makes a convincing argument for individual variability in bees personalities and why and how their choices may be affected by their size, which correlates to how much they were fed as larvae, and any other predispositions that make them better at one task or another, or more or less adventurous and relentless in their pursuit of pollen and nectar, and even their preference for one or the other. The experiments to study the bees' behaviour were really interesting. You'd think it would be easier to confuse a bee so they'd get a little lost, but they haven't been getting enough credit for how good they are at navigating the world. A wonderful read.

My one nitpick is the use of the term "vegan" for bees, as opposed to wasps, who are carnivores. Veganism is a term used by people to denote not eating or using animal products for any number of ethical reasons. People not eating animal products for health reasons usually refer to themselves as plant-based. Animals who only eat plants, unless someone changed it and didn't tell me, are called herbivores.

[Jessica McKendry · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The Mind of a Bee" is an absolutely incredible book about (you guessed it) the minds of bees! A very deep delve into the sensory world of bees, you start to understand what is important to them and how they perceive the world. Sometimes this book had some sciency references that were a little hard for a lay person like me to follow, but overall this book was very easy to understand and was written very well. I also learned some amazing things, and I'll try to be less afraid of bees.

From what scientists can tell, bees feel pain. They also have very rich and complex emotional lives, they can learn from each other as well as other animals, they can be taught to solve complex problems, and their minds are incredibly powerful thinking machines. Currently, we can't even design a robot that behaves as efficiently as a bee.

Bees also have their own dance language which they use to represent distance, direction, and duration, to tell hive members where to go to find flower patches. Besides humans, bees are the only known animal to use symbolism to indicate actual places. Bees also have culture that can be passed down from one generation to the next. However, in colder climates, it seems that cultural evolution stops in the winter because of hibernation. Also, bees are not a "hive mind" like you see in science fiction (no animal is, as far as we can tell), each bee is very much an individual and can have its own ideas about itself and the world. Oh and bees are also self aware.

Sadly, the bees are disappearing. Domesticated bees do not fill the gap that wild bees leave, and they often quickly consume the food resources that wild bees need to survive on Earth. Wild bees have adapted to humanities influence on life on Earth, using plastic to build nests, nesting in cities, or feeding on sugary waste from soda instead of flowers. But this is not enough. If you want to save the bees, please don't start beekeeping. These are domesticated bees, and we need more wild bees.

The author of this book recommends us to plant more wildflowers to help attract wild bees to your area. Bees are not creatures to be afraid of (unless you're allergic) and they are intelligent beings that deserve our respect. If that's not enough, then without them, the great pollinators, our food sources would disappear. We literally need them to survive.

[Riccardo Mazzocchio · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nella Mente di un Ape è libro rivoluzionario. Scritto da un ricercatore del settore e non da un divulgatore fa uso di evidenze scientifiche descritte tramite grafici e figure per argomentare su cosa vuol dire essere un Ape. Se provvisti di qualche nozione di neurobiologia e biologia comparativa, la lettura diventa ancora più comprensibile e piacevole. Non occorre avere un grande cervello in termini assoluti per dimostrare comportamenti intelligenti, acquisire nuove abilità e avere coscienza di sé e delle proprie azioni. Il piccolo cervello dell’ape è fatto apposta per elaborare, ritenere e recuperare le informazioni che i suoi sensori gli inviano e che hanno a che fare in modo specifico con la funzione principe di questo insetto: raccogliere il nettare e impollinare i fiori. Le api sono in grado di integrare le informazioni multisensoriali in modo tale da sviluppare una propria individualità (e forse un livello di minima coscienza) dimostrando per es. una maggiore o minore propensione e capacità a svolgere i diversi compiti che le attendono. Infine, le api in vero pericolo per pesticidi, campi e terreni senza fiori da impollinare, etc. non sono quelle degli allevamenti domestici ma quelle libere in natura.

[Olive Fellows (abookolive) · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating account of the astonishing capabilities of bees. The author is an academic, but this is far from a stuffy read. What you'll learn about bees will make your jaw drop!


Click here to hear more of my thoughts on this book over on my Booktube channel, abookolive!

[Ari · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well researched book that explains what we know about how bees (and other insects) perceive the world. The author does a good job of not only explaining a complex topic but also in arguing that there’s a lot more going on inside a bee’s head than we typically give them credit for. A quick and engaging read!

[Dona's Books]

DNF @ 35%

I just couldn't connect to the style of this one.

[Петър Стойков · Rating 3 out of 5]

За това колко точно са интелигентни животните се говори доста напоследък и се правят доста експерименти - след като, за всеобщо щастие, "научното" течение според което те са просто празни роботи, управлявани от инстинкти, умря заедно със създателите си. Както знаем oт М. Планк, науката напредва чак когато учените със стари възгледи умрат, щото докато крепят живи мощи по ръководните катедри в университетите, не дават на никой с по-нови възгледи да се издигне, ако оборва техните.

Вече имахме кефа да прочетем за това колко са интелигентни животните и най-вече бозайниците (доста), птиците (някои доста, повечете не) и октоподите (странна работа е там) и ето, че стигнахме и до пчелите (не са).

Самата книга е просто една по-дълга статия, разтегната на 300 страници. Да, много изследвания има на това какво правят пчелите, как и защо, но като цяло повечето от тях не доказват кой знае какво в областта на интелигентността на пчелите.

[Ted · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have an interest in bees mostly because I like photographing them. This is a very good book, but in some ways too detailed and scientific for me. Not that it is full of complicated mathematical analyses but he does site many scientific studies about bees, including ones that didn't succeed in proving their point. I sometimes was only interested in what has been 'proven' not every study that has been done. But then I'm not a scientist. It is phenomenal how much we know about bees and their minds. The book is very enlightening in showing how the sensory organisms of bees provide their minds with different information than our human senses do. For example, bees can see ultraviolet light, the sun's light polarity, the earth's magnetic field and even the electromagnetic charge on flowers. So, they "see" the world very differently than we do. Their minds have evolved to deal with these sensory inputs. They are able to process a great deal of information and can problem solve, 'remember' information, adapt to environmental changes, learn, and read communications from other bees. Pretty amazing.

[Sasha Moser · Rating 5 out of 5]

I already knew most of the basic information about how bees operate in their tragically short life, but this book delved deeper and explained more detailed, in scientific terms of what bumble bees and honey bees feel, their ability to solve problems, their “intelligence” for selecting and agreeing in a new home location after a swarm and so many more complexities relating to bees.

The Mind of A Bee is on a heavier side of science and is filled with technical information involving various experiments, tests, and observations that were performed to study these amazing insects. Would probably not recommend for those who are seeking a brief summary information about bees. This is more for science fans and detail-oriented folk.

Still, an amazing book about amazing, (and often under appreciated) creatures that contribute more to this planet than some humans do.

[Gabi K · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you’ve ever been a smidge interested in bees, then this will blow your mind!!! I liked how it wasn’t just fact spitting, and took the time to comprehensively explain experiments, results and implications (there are also fancy colored diagrams and pictures 😜). It was very science-y and still engaging. The touch of social commentary from the scientific lens of bee research was also neat. Walked away from this book with a ton of appreciation for ye ole buzzers and for the folks who are conducting these studies.

[Laurel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Learnt a lot and I have a new found awe of the bee!

[kurp · Rating 3 out of 5]

Niezła, choć dość wymagająca. Ciekawe, że sporo przywołanych badań pochodzi sprzed wielu dekad, często z XIX wieku. W wielu eksperymentach równie ciekawe jak zachowania pszczół wydały mi się pomysły uczonych na to, jak skonstruować eksperyment zdolny zweryfikować hipotezę. Wielki szacunek dla umysłów, które przy dawnym ubostwie środków potrafiły wyciągać naprawdę nieoczywiste wnioski.

[Ma'Belle · Rating 3 out of 5]

The narrator SOUNDS LIKE A BEE!!!! I couldn't get over his voice, especially every time he said "be," "believe," or any other word starting with the "bee" sound.

[Anshuman Swain · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 rounded up to 5.

An intensive dive into the behavior, anatomy and ecology of bees. The author does a good job of explaining why understanding these aspects will help us to see bees and insects in new light: conscious, adaptive, intelligent organisms - like us - rather than mindless hardwired machines depicted often in mass media.

[sophie marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

dnf because it was a little too textbooky and due at the library but this was full of super cool info & i love bees

[Mara S · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely fascinating! This book has significantly grown my adoration for bees. Everyone should read this book!

[Randy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engaging and witty and delightful! So clear and helpful

[Monica]

The books I read for class WILL count towards my goal

[Zarathustra Goertzel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is perhaps a must-read for those interested in autonomous AI. The central question is: "how do we probe the mind of a bee to figure out what's going on?" Does knowing the code of an AI exempt us from this kind of study?

Lars Chittka begins with an exploration of the bees' senses. Bees can apparently sense electrical charge to an extent, thus detecting whether a flower has recently been visited by a bee (as bees are positively charged whereas flowers are grounded). Sensing polarized light as well as ultraviolet instead of red is also interesting and seems to help facilitate their navigation capabilities. It seems these color receptor cones in insects evolved prior to the matching colorful flowers 😯🤓

Next up is the question and instinct vs learning, detailing experiments on the capacity of bees to learn. How does one test their working memory? How do they explore space, learn to return to the hive, etc? Can bees take shortcuts? Do bees have a cognitive map of the landscape or do they navigate via other means? How do bees make decisions about where to set up a new home? How do bees convey locations to each other? (A: "dance communication" ;D) Are there personality differences in bees? Do bees exhibit context-specific pain modulation? Are bees aware of their own size dimensions vs larger-or-smaller bees? And lastly, to what extent and in what manner might bees be sentiently conscious? "Is Distinguishing Self-Generated from Other-Generated Sensory Stimuli at the Roots of the Evolution of Consciousness?"

[Prag Sharma · Rating 4 out of 5]

For your next project, you have been tasked with coming up with an alien life-form that is completely different from ours. How would these aliens behave, live, eat, mate, fight? Well, get all your inspiration from a single source - Hymenoptera (wasps and bees). There are 20,000+ bee species in this world.

Explained via a series of experiments that the author and others have conducted as part of their research over the decades, the book lays bare how amazingly complex bees are (they have just 850,000 neurons, as opposed to the human brain which has a 100,000 times more).

300-degree vision, eyes that process information faster than any human's, sensitivity to earth's magnetic and electric fields, ability to taste with antennas, spatial awareness across vast distances, social learning abilities that are more impressive than those of many people I know, personality differences that are as varied as the people I hang out with and unparalleled dance moves used to communicate in the dark (which would have been helpful to me in college), are part of a standard bee's world!

Most fun fact: The Jewel Wasp stings its cockroaches victim in the brain, in a very specific spot, so that the victim is neither paralysed nor deprived of its senses; instead it turns into a zombie who can't control its actions. The wasp simply leads the victim to its burrow, where it is slowly consumed alive by the wasp's hungry children!

Super fun read throughout!

[AB Freeman · Rating 3 out of 5]

An incredibly rich and complex examination of the interior life of bees, well-suited to those with a deep and abiding interest in scientific experimentation and its subsequent nomenclatures. I am not one of them. While the subject is utterly fascinating, I found my mind wandering all too often as I struggled to maintain interest in its presentation. That said, the importance of understanding the subjectively conscious life of bees is not lost on me. I simply have little interest in the extreme amount of detail that Chittka presents. The book does not feel extraordinarily accessible to the scientific layman, and I believe it suffers as a result.

3 stars. Recommended for those with a scientific mind, but not for those interested in broad strokes that help connect a deeper understanding of bee life and/or sentience to their conservation in general. Glad I pressed through, but finishing this book was a challenge I cared very little to complete. I may have gained more by reading a shorter, yet comprehensive, meta-analysis of the prevailing literature.

[Santiago Hernandez · Rating 4 out of 5]

One week ago, I walked into a bookstore and spotted this book immediately. I've been meaning to be more "spontaneous" about the books I read i.e. reading something out of my intrinsic interest at the time rather than resorting to personal book lists. So, I walked out with this book, and I must say, despite having NEVER read anything related to bees or insects for that matter, it was a fantastic read! Chittka covers an assortment of topics, ranging from how bees visualize the world, how they communicate, their intelligence and differences between bees as well as colonies, and whether bees have consciousness. Throughout each chapter, Chittka includes and explains (in layman's terms) the studies that give possible explanations to each chapter's question. Overall, great read.

[Kate Atonic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quick summary - the author scientifically discusses current and historical research done to understand how bees think, learn, and share information. I like reading about design of experiments, and bees are cool. This book is approachable, but not for everyone.

First off - there were very few photos of insects in this book. Insects are cool, but seeing them up close (esp. with extreme magnification of compound eyes) gives me the heebies.

Second thing - scientists that study living creatures without at least a little appreciation and delight in the subject come across as SUCH sociopathic assholes. Looking at YOU, Jean-Henri Fabre. Let’s see YOU see in ultraviolet, you pompous jerk. Bet your vomit tastes horrible on pancakes, you insensitive twat. Can YOU fly?

Third - friendly reminder that governments that ban books, limit their scientists, and discriminate for religion, gender, race, or ideology are not good governments. I was talking about Nazis, who did you think I was discussing?

🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝

Some cool stuff I learned so you don’t have to read it yourself:

1. Bees and ants can see in ultraviolet, which we can’t see, but are largely blind to red, which we can. Their photo-receptors evolved in parallel with color development in flowers - no surprise.

2. Darwin played piano to earthworms and bees; both audiences were reported as “largely unimpressed” - though history does not note whether Darwin was any good.

3. Bees memorize important landmarks by direction and relative to the sun, so if you go moving bees at night they’ll be totally lost the next day. If you move a hive a couple of feet, the bees will go to where they expect their hive to be and not immediately return to their home - possibly because they’re not sure whether it is a rival hive and they’ll be snuffed by guard bees.

3a. Bee-vision polarizes sunlight into concentric circles with the sun in the middle, which is why they understand the direction of the sun on cloudy days.

3b. Bees kept in an unlit lab with no windows surprised researchers by scent-marking trails upon which they walked in the dark. “Life, uh, finds a way” - Ian Malcom

4. Male butterflies have light receptors on their genitalia to help them copulate, which no doubt explains why butterflies joke about “seeing stars” after a particularly successful session.

5. Bees can taste with their mouthparts, antenna, and with their feet. They can’t be fooled by artificial sweeteners like saccharine. They don’t like bitter or sour substances with the exception of some neonicontinoids used as pesticides.

6. Bees don’t have eardrums, so they don’t hear like humans, but they do hear. A new human that has never gone to a heavy metal concert hears 20-20,000 Hz. Bees feel air movements with their antenna, sensing sound waves ranging from 20-500 Hz, and can feel hive vibrations with their feet. Like Rhianna said, “let the bass from the speakers run through ya sneakers.” (Or was that Bee-yoncé?)

7. Bees are surrounded by a small positive electrical field, and flowers are (literally) grounded or slightly negative. Bees can tell when a flower has been recently visited by the change in electrical charge of the blossom.

8. Honeycomb is a marvel of engineering, and if you interfere with the preferred method of placing the hexes, bees adapt in clever and beautiful ways. Bees in zero gravity on the space station made their usual hexes but didn’t angle the boxes, as they do on earth, because gravity wouldn’t make the honey leak out.

9. When a honey bee returns to the hive having found a particularly good nectar or pollen source, she does a very detailed wiggle dance that shares the information with a crowd of interested hive mates, including distance and direction. This behavior isn’t seen in agricultural settings so much as in rain forests, where a tree in bloom would be like an oasis in a desert.

9a. Researchers put a high-reward sucrose solution in a little blue ring, and slid it under a plexiglass sheet. Out of 100 bees, 2 were able to figure out how to pull the string to get expose the treat. But once they did the trick spread to all the other bees. Some bees would work together to get the treats out. The author notes than in any experiment with lots of bees, one or two in every group would stand out as particularly clever and teach their tricks to the other bees.

9b. In another experiment, bees had to roll a ball to a goal to get the reward. The two closest balls were glued down and wouldn’t move. The naive bees observing this maneuver were then allowed to try, but none of the balls were glued down. Rather than just mimic the procedure, the new bees optimized the process, moving the closest ball to the goal.

10. Researchers can follow the wandering of individual bees by attaching a 15 mg transponder. Unclear whether the bees can get a wifi signal.

11. Bees could be trained to solve maze puzzles (e.g., turn right if the entrance is blue, left if yellow) and retained the memory for life.

12. Bees need to sleep and will rest several hours each day during the eternal daylight of polar summer.

13. Individual bees have different personalities - hard working, aggressive, clever, how they make decisions, whether they take the scenic routes or direct flights home, etc. Hive mind isn’t what we thought. Hives that were specifically bred to be particularly clever ended up being a lot more successful at nectar recovery, but they often didn’t work as long or as hard as the ones bred to be dumb. In the end, both hives probably gathered about the same amounts.

[Kallie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really accessible book about how bees evolved, communicate, sense things, understand things, and generally exist in the world. I'll be adding this to the collection at my work.

[Risha · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an amazing, well written and incredibly informative book!

This is the first non fiction science book (that I've read for myself and not for my students) that I've read in years. Lars Chittka manages to write in a way that is not only entertaining and informative, but also easy to follow and understand.

I think this book has changed my life? I loved bees before reading, but understanding how they sense and view the world around them has truly opened the floodgates in how I'll perceive them, and the other little guys around us.

I also really appreciate the afterword and the highlighting the importance of our native bees. They are beautiful insects who we really do depend on, and we ought to do right by them.

If you love bees, or have any interest in them I highly recommend this book! If any of my friends want to borrow this book, I'm more than happy to lend it to you 🥹💕 Please be ready for bee facts at any hangouts I'm at now.

[Tatyana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Until this book, I had no idea that there were so many studies over the last few centuries on the bees: individual and swarm behavior, levels of intelligence, logic and habits vs instincts.. So fascinating!
I listened to it in audio format and could not stop, heard all of 7+ hours in one day.
This book gave me new appreciation for the honey and bees wax, and all the hard work put in to producing it. It brought a sort of awareness that I will apply to how I treat bees (including bumble bees) and their food (flowers).

[Alma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vähän yllättäen tää kirja kävi englanninkielentaitoni ylärajoilla kuunneltuna. Pitää ehkä palata fyysiseen kopioon joskus. Se, mitä tästä kirjasta opin, oli kuitenkin tosi kiehtovaa ja haastoi jälleen kuvaa eläinten – tässä tapauksessa etenkin ötököiden – älynlahjoista jotenkin tosi erilaisena ja heikkona ihmiseen nähden. Samalla täytyy jälleen huvittuneena arvostaa oman lajini loputtoman uteliasisuuden ajamaa draivia, joka saa meidän viemään mehiläisiä avaruuteen, monitoroimaan koko niiden elämänkaaren liikkeitä teknisillä härpäkkeillä ja rakentamaan kaikenlaisia älypulmia niille.

[S. · Rating 3 out of 5]

We owe the bees so act accordingly !

I enjoyed listening to this book, the way it was organized in short chapters all of which culminate towards one conclusion: the complexity of bees behavior and life. At some point the author concurred that it was impossible to build a bee robot while other scholars believed that there was a hidden force behind the dynamics of bees and their ability to adapt and evolve …

Superb read if you like to know more about wildlife and insects !!

[Kaitlin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an interesting and informative read. I loved that the author included pictures and diagrams. It helped to have a visual representation of the information. The subject matter was engrossing. I did not realize how complex the brains and behavior is. It made me think about the lives of insects, especially the social ones. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in animals, nature, or in our natural world.

[Claira Mittman · Rating 5 out of 5]

very informative and a super interesting read. it was a little dense, which is why I almost gave it 4 instead of 5... but absolutely eye opening information and well argued premise so it does deserve the highest rating I think